Arizona Senate issues fresh subpoenas for 2020 Election audit!

PHOENIX, Arizona (PNN) - July 27, 2021 - Arizona senators issued a new subpoena to the state’s largest county on July 26 for materials related to the 2020 election.

Arizona Senate President Karen Fann and Arizona Senate Judiciary Chairman Warren Petersen have ordered Maricopa County’s Board of Supervisors to turn over ballot envelopes or ballot envelope images, voter records, and routers or router images.

The Board was also commanded to provide all findings concerning any systems breach that took place within six months of the November 3, 2020 election, as well as all usernames and passwords for machines used in the election.

The Board was also told to appear at the Arizona State Capitol for a hearing on August 2.

Failure to comply may constitute contempt of the Legislature, the Board was told.

Fann said in a statement that the county “continues to withhold vital information from the public and the auditors which has created additional costs, months of delays, and a lack of transparency on their part.”

A Board spokesman told media outlets that the county “has already provided everything competent auditors would need to confirm the accuracy and security of the 2020 election.”

“The Board will review the materials requested with our legal team and respond in the coming days,” the spokesman said.

Senators also subpoenaed information from Dominion Voting Systems, whose machines Maricopa County leases. Dominion said in a statement to news outlets that it wouldn’t comply with the subpoena, which seeks administrative passwords for the machines.

Contractors hired by the state Senate have been conducting an audit of the 2020 election in Maricopa County since April. The county submitted the nearly 2.1 million ballots cast in the election, as well as 385 tabulators and other items.

Those items were ordered to be turned over by subpoenas issued late last year.

But county officials refused to provide some of the subpoenaed items despite a judge ruling the subpoenas lawful, after the county claimed that they were overbroad and outside the scope of the Arizona Senate’s authority.

County officials said in May that they couldn’t hand over routers or router images because doing so would pose a security risk.

Arizona senators initially threatened to issue a fresh subpoena then. It isn’t clear why they waited until July 26 to do so.

The Arizona Senate voted in February, before the judge ruled on the matter, on a resolution to hold the county in contempt.

Republicans control the Senate, 16–14.